FROM GOD S PERSPECTIVE

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1 Luke 17:11-19 October 9, 2016 FROM GOD S PERSPECTIVE In a psychology class I took back when I was in college, we learned all about human perspective. I remember the professor saying to us, Our perspective is biased. Every human being views the world through his or her own personal prism, which causes them to see the world from their own unique point of view. The way you see the world is different perhaps significantly different than the way I or any other person sees the world. This distinct perspective, said my college professor, is the result of many things, such as our life experiences, our upbringing, our education, and even our genetic makeup. Think about that. None of us sees the world around us, the places we visit and the people we encounter, in the same way. If all of us were outside together right now, and we all looked up toward the heavens, one of us might be mesmerized by the clear blue sky, another might focus on the puffy white clouds floating by, and yet another might notice a jet plane streaking through the air, leaving a long white contrail behind. Even looking at the very same human being, we each have different, individual perspectives. One person looks at a homeless person on the street and sees a worthless bum who needs to find a job, while another sees an individual who, perhaps through no fault of his or her own, fell upon hard times, and thinks, There, but for the grace of God, go I. I m talking here about human perspective. But now let s imagine looking at the world the way God sees it. Yes, I know, seeing the world from God s perspective is impossible. After all, the Bible tells us that God s ways aren t our ways, and God s thoughts aren t our thoughts. But, humor me for a minute. Let s use our imaginations and ask ourselves the question, What would it be like to see the world and other human beings from God s perspective? What would it be like to see ourselves, our loved ones, the people we encounter, and yes, even our enemies, the way God sees them? In this morning s Gospel reading, Jesus gave us an example of seeing other human beings people who were needy, suffering and ostracized from society with the compassionate eyes of God. On his way to Jerusalem, where a cross awaited him, our Lord saw

2 what everyone else chose to ignore: ten lepers on the outskirts of a village. It s not that no one else saw them. I m sure dozens of other people had noticed those lepers when they passed by them, before Jesus encountered them. And probably the perspective of those other people caused a red flag to be raised in their minds. Lepers were to be strictly avoided because they were unclean, and they could make you unclean if you got too close to them. So those who first encountered them most likely crossed the street as fast as they could, or quickened their pace to hurry on by before they were contaminated. That s a typical, and not uncommon, human perspective. It s the perspective of self-preservation, of taking care of one s own needs and best interests, even if it meant ignoring or turning one s back on the needs and best interests of another human being. In contrast to that common human perspective of caring for oneself first, Jesus saw the lepers through the prism of God s eyes. The eyes of loving concern and compassion. Jesus saw, just as God saw, the lepers pain and isolation. He heard their cries of loneliness and despair, mingled with a tinge of hope that Jesus could and would help them. Jesus, master, have pity on us! Jesus saw the ten lepers he truly saw them; and he heard them he genuinely heard them, the way God saw them and heard their pleas for help. And most importantly, he stopped to be with them and respond to their need. Because, seeing from God s perspective, through God s eyes, that s what Jesus knew he should do. That was the right thing to do. Jesus response makes me wonder. What if we had a similar perspective? How would our lives change if we looked at those on the outskirts of our community people whom our society has rejected and tends to scorn, criticize and judge negatively what if we saw such people as Jesus saw them: through the prism of God s eyes; the way God sees them; with God s perspective of compassion and loving concern? That would be difficult for us, to be sure. It would be a genuine challenge. After all, because Jesus saw the world and human beings through God s eyes, he saw Samaritans differently than most others around him. And he was severely criticized for it. Even so, Jesus knew that God loved and cared about the Samaritan people, despite the fact that the Jews had a long-standing hatred toward them. And that hatred ran both ways. Samaritans also despised the Jews, and at one point in history they even teamed up with Israel s enemies and fought in a war against the Jewish people. In that sense, the Samaritan who was healed by Jesus saw him, a reviled Jew, through God s eyes: the eyes of 2

3 impartiality. You see, the Samaritan knew a miracle from God when he experienced one, even if it happened to him at the hands of a Jew. And that caused his perspective to change. It opened his mind to see a race of people he had despised his entire life from a different, more tolerant and loving point of view. After the Samaritan s healing, he saw things from a different point of view. From God s perspective. What would happen if we saw things, and saw other people, from God s perspective? Through God s eyes? Some see all Muslims as terrorists. God sees them as God s children. Some judge and criticize others who are different, who don t look like us or act like us or believe like us. God s eyes look beyond the outer differences and peripheral dissimilarities and see the common, divine relationship that exists between all human beings, all of whom were made in God s image and likeness. Our way is to love cautiously and measuredly, in the hopeful expectation that we will receive love in return. God s perspective is to love extravagantly and lavishly, without counting the cost, even when that love isn t responded to or reciprocated. Again, I encourage you to ask yourselves, how would your life change, and how would the world be transformed and blessed, if you and I and every human being chose to look at the world and see one another through God s eyes; from God s perspective? Perhaps then we really would take seriously the words of the Lord s Prayer we recite in worship every week: Thy will (God s will) be done on earth as it is in heaven. Before we can do God s will here on earth, we have to begin looking at things from a divine viewpoint. To know and do God s will, we need God s perspective. I think by seeing things from God s perspective, our lives, and the world, would change. Or at least it would start to change. Because seeing from God s perspective, we would unite rather than divide. We would heal and rebuild rather than hurt and tear down. We would show mercy and forgiveness, instead of blaming and holding grudges against others. We would tolerate and love rather than pass judgement and condemn. Corrie ten Boom was a Dutch watchmaker and Christian who, along with her father and other family members, helped many Jews escape the Nazi Holocaust during World War II. She was imprisoned for her actions, but survived to record her horrific experience in her most famous book, The Hiding Place. After the war, she spoke to many audiences about what she went 3

4 through, and the importance of forgiving even your worst enemy. But on one of those speaking engagements, Corrie Ten Boom s capacity to forgive was greatly tested. Here s what happened, in her own words. It was in a church in Munich that I saw him a balding, heavyset man in a gray overcoat, a brown felt hat clutched between his hands. People were filing out of the basement room where I had just spoken, moving along the rows of wooden chairs to the door at the rear. It was 1947, and I had come from Holland to defeated Germany with the message that God forgives. It was the truth they needed most to hear in that bitter, bombed-out land, and I gave them my favorite mental picture. Maybe because the sea is never far from a Hollander s mind, I liked to think that s where forgiven sins were thrown. When we confess our sins, I said, God casts them into the deepest ocean, gone forever. And even though I cannot find a Scripture for it, I believe God then places a sign out there that says, No Fishing Allowed. The solemn faces stared back at me, not quite daring to believe. There were never questions after a talk in Germany in People stood up in silence, in silence collected their wraps, and in silence left the room. And that s when I saw him, working his way forward against the others. One moment I noticed the overcoat and the brown hat; the next, a blue uniform and a visored cap with its skull and crossbones. And it came back to me with a rush: the huge room with its harsh overhead lights; the pathetic pile of dresses and shoes in the center of the floor; the shame of walking naked past this man.... I had encountered him at the concentration camp in which I had been imprisoned: Ravensbruck. This man who was making his way forward was a former guard there one of its most cruel guards. Now he was in front of me, hand thrust out. A fine message, Frauline! How good it is to know that, as you say, all our sins are at the bottom of the sea! And I, who had spoken so glibly of forgiveness, fumbled in my pocketbook rather than take that hand. He would not remember me, of course how could he remember one prisoner among the thousands of women? But I remembered him, and the leather crop swinging from his belt. I was face-to-face with one of my captors and my blood seemed to freeze. You mentioned Ravensbruck in your talk, he was saying. I was a guard there. No, he did not remember me. But since that time, he went on, I have become a Christian. I know that God has forgiven me for the 4

5 cruel things I did there, but I would like to hear it from your lips, Frauline. Again the hand came out. Will you forgive me? And I stood there I whose sins had again and again needed to be forgiven and could not forgive. My sister Betsie had died in that place. Could he erase her slow, terrible death simply for the asking? It could not have been many seconds that he stood there, hand held out, but to me it seemed hours as I wrestled with the most difficult thing I ever had to do. For I had to do it I knew that. The message that God forgives has a prior condition: that we forgive those who have injured us. If you do not forgive [others] their trespasses, Jesus says, neither will your Father in heaven forgive your trespasses. I knew it not only as a commandment of God, but as a daily experience. Since the end of the war I had had a home in Holland for victims of Nazi brutality. Those who were able to forgive their former enemies were able also to return to the outside world and rebuild their lives, no matter what the physical scars. Those who nursed their bitterness remained invalids. It was as simple and horrible as that. And still I stood there with the coldness clutching my heart. But forgiveness is not an emotion I knew that, too. Forgiveness is an act of will, and the will can function regardless of the temperature of the heart. Jesus, help me! I prayed silently. I can lift my hand. I can do that much. You supply the feeling. And so, woodenly, mechanically, I thrust my hand into the one stretched out to me. And as I did, and incredible thing took place. The current started in my shoulder, raced down my arm and sprang into our joined hands. And then this healing warmth seemed to flood my whole being, bringing tears to my eyes. I forgive you, brother, I cried. With all my heart. For a long moment we grasped each other s hands the former guard and the former prisoner. I had never known God s love so intensely as I did then. But even so, I realized it was not my love. I had tried, and did not have the power. It was the power of the Holy Spirit.... It is the power of God s Holy Spirit that allows us to see with God s eyes, and see as God sees. That s what allowed Corrie ten Boom to see her former captor as a brother and bless him with the forgiveness he didn t deserve, but which God wanted her to bestow on although he was once her worst enemy. Seeing others as God sees them with mercy, forgiveness, compassion, and unconditional acceptance whether they be a former Nazi guard, a despised Samaritan afflicted with leprosy, or anyone else we 5

6 personally have decided, for whatever reason, we won t accept and can t love is perhaps our greatest and most difficult challenge as Christians. Learning to bestow grace and blessings on those people we have no desire to bestow grace and blessings on can really only happen if we look at them with a different set of eyes: God s eyes, and see them as God sees them. Is that difficult to do? Of course it is. But just imagine how looking at the world and other people with God s vision could expand and deepen our own vision. And just imagine how we, our society and the world might change for the better if we chose to perceive things, even in a limited way, the way God perceives them. So, my prayer this morning is that God will give us the courage and the will to see the world and the people around us through God s eyes. From God s perspective. Amen. 6